FBI Director Says Nancy Guthrie Video May Have Been Erased During Days-Long Access Delay

A delay in bringing the FBI into the investigation of Nancy Guthrie’s suspected abduction may have jeopardized key video evidence, FBI Director Kash Patel said, citing the complicated effort to retrieve Nest doorbell footage from the scene. Guthrie did not have a cloud subscription, and the physical camera was also missing, making the recovery process especially difficult.

Authorities say Guthrie, the mother of “Today” co-host Savannah Guthrie, was taken from her home in Tucson, Arizona, in the early morning hours of Feb. 1.

The FBI partnered with Google to recover cached video from Guthrie’s Nest camera, Patel told INC News. The footage had not been saved for long-term storage and was close to being erased.

Any additional footage, if it existed, may have disappeared before federal investigators joined the case. Whether that missing material would have had evidentiary value is still unclear.

“We were looking for the needle of all needles in all haystacks, because since she didn’t pay for it, they didn’t record that data,” Patel said. “But there was a chance that it was located in their cache just before it was being deleted.”

Investigators ultimately located the video and still images Patel released publicly on Feb. 10, hoping the public could help identify the suspect and provide information leading to an arrest.

Soon afterward, FBI specialists developed a preliminary physical description. The masked suspect is believed to be between 5 feet 9 inches and 5 feet 10 inches tall, with a medium build. He was seen carrying a black Ozark Trail backpack.

A masked man appeared on Guthrie’s Nest camera at least twice — once on the day of her Feb. 1 abduction, and once about three weeks earlier, INC News has reported previously. Authorities have not publicly ruled out the potential for additional suspects in the case.

There is only a single still image publicly available from the earlier visit. Experts say it’s likely that video existed at one point.

If the FBI were involved sooner, agents may have been able to recover additional evidence, which potentially may have included a suspect vehicle, more footage of the masked intruder or even additional imagery from a prior visit to Guthrie’s home, Patel said.

“What we do know is that the longer you wait, there’s no chance of recovering the video,” said Morgan Wright, the CEO and founder of the National Center for Open and Unsolved Cases. “The earlier you get started, the better your chances. Waiting four days may have been fatal to the recovery of some video that could have been more illuminating.”

Time is the enemy of all investigations and the thief of vital evidence. You can never go back and get this evidence once it’s gone. Time is the most critical factor in any investigation, whether it’s finding the suspect, finding the victim, or finding the evidence.

Because Google and the FBI were able to recover at least some video through this process, it’s fair to infer that earlier video would have existed as well, Wright told INC News.

“If this was recovered from a backend cache, and it was almost deleted, that implies that another video was deleted because they would have been able to recover more than what they did,” he said. “Timing is always an issue.”

At this point, however, whatever may or may not have existed remains unknown and unavailable to investigators.

“Time is the enemy of all investigations and the thief of vital evidence,” Wright said. “You can never go back and get this evidence once it’s gone. Time is the most critical factor in any investigation, whether it’s finding the suspect, finding the victim, or finding the evidence.”

Patel has previously said the FBI was ready to help on day one and explained this week that he wanted to deploy scores of FBI personnel from the outset. However, local authorities didn’t request the FBI’s assistance for four days.

By the time the FBI arrived, the crime scene had already been released. People had been allowed to knock on Guthrie’s front door, where her blood was on the porch. It was secured once more, and FBI agents spent hours examining the home and the yard, collecting additional home security cameras.

Pima County Sheriff Chris Nanos has countered that an FBI task force member was present during the initial stages of the investigation — however that officer is not a federal agent.

The sheriff’s department declined to comment for this story.

Anyone with information on Guthrie’s kidnapping is asked to dial 1-800-CALL-FBI or 520-88-CRIME to remain anonymous.

The combined sum of rewards in this case is more than $1.2 million.